Page 99 of Hot Lap
The AetherX party is everything he expected — stark and saturated in equal parts. Up-lit panels along matte black walls. Modern art installations hovering in midair. Staff wearing slate-gray suits with AetherX's neon-accented logo along their lapels.The music is clean and bass-heavy, and the drinks glitter under spotlights. The earthy resinous scent ofoudpermeates the room.
Reece doesn’t miss a beat as they walk in, but he feels every eye land on them. This time he knows Maiken is armed and ready.
He feels proper chuffed, until he notices Graham’s crew working the room. There’s a flash of a shoulder rig and a glint of branded lanyards, nothing worrisome. Except the man himself is holding court near the gallery wall, a champagne flute in one hand, the other gesturing expansively as if the conversation needs more room to contain his ego. Behind him, his film crew is already panning toward the entrance.
Of course he brought the cameras.
The thing is, if AetherX granted access, Reece can’t override it. Not without violating his own media clause, the one Graham negotiated years ago.
Maiken clocks it too, but her spine stays straight and her expression doesn’t change.
Petra floats past them with two AetherX executives flanking her, laughing like she owns the air. She sees the cameras, notices Reece and Maiken drawing their focus, and she pivots immediately, positioning herself between them and the biggest lens.
It’s a good move, but it doesn’t work. The camera ops just reposition for another shot.
Graham approaches them minutes later, casual and crocodile-slick. “Reece. You always clean up well.” He eyes the cuff on Maiken’s wrist, then her whole look. “Did you two coordinate, or is that just animal instinct?”
Reece ignores him.
Maiken turns toward him slowly. “Good evening, Graham.”
Graham’s smile stretches. “I’ve been meaning to catch up with you, Ms. Lange. Though I must admit, I expected your dress to be a little more on-brand.”
The bait lands hard on the floor between them.
Maiken tilts her head. “Oh? Whatbrandis that?”
Reece holds his breath.
His father’s jaw tightens. She’s backed him into a wall of his own making.
Behind them, the camera crew pretends not to catch the moment, but they definitely do.
Graham pivots back toward Reece. “You know this whole redemption arc only plays if she behaves.”
Reece understands every layered insult behind that sentence. Especially,behaves, like Mai’s an unruly mutt that slipped her leash and piddled in the corner. “Look,sheisn’t the problem. You just don’t know what to do with a woman who rejects the approved script. Right?”
His father’s mouth twitches, not into a smile, but something uglier.Satisfaction.
Graham knows exactly what he’s doing. Reece won’t make a scene in front of the AetherX execs and under the subtle eye of every lens in the room. Not when this entire event could be repackaged into a B-roll montage forPaddock Accessby tomorrow morning.
Reece doesn’t trust himself to continue because there’s no middle ground with Graham anymore. Diplomacy has failed, which leaves only the nuclear option.
His father is taking advantage of that. As long as Reece doesn’t detonate, Graham will keep pressing the button, over and over, knowing his son will absorb every hit and swallow the damage whole.
This makesbrillianttelly.
So now, Maiken is the target, and Reece is forced to smile through clenched teeth while the man who long ago claimed a stake in his image drops napalm into the open air like it’s harmless.
Until his wife reminds him that she’s got her own warhead as she turns toward Graham with the kind of composure that makes people go quiet.
“I’ve been called many things, Graham Pritchard. Dancer, teacher, now wife.” She speaks with precision. “But you’re the only man who’s ever barged into my husband’s bedroom, looked me in the eye, and assumed I’d beenpaidto be there.”
Graham goes still.
The silence around them tightens as everyone pays attention.
“I didn’t ask your son for anything last Sunday night. Not a dollar. Not a ring. Not even his last name.” Her smile is surgical. “You assumed I was a whore, because it was easier than admitting he might’ve seen something in me that didn’t come with a receipt. Which says more about you than it does about me, doesn't it?”
